Catch 'Em All
by Resonae
Summary: About half the people in the world have certain animal-like characteristics and have strange powers, and are called Poke-humes. Will is even stranger than the normal Poke-hume, not that he'll tell anyone.


I own nothing. So I had this sort of just rotting in my computer because I wrote this like more than half a year ago. I was gonna continue it but I never got around to it, and I decided it could sort of sit alone by itself. Better than just getting stale in my files..

* * *

His ears flattened on his head. Or at least, they flattened as much as they could. Will was aware that no one could see him in the dark anyway, save his crimson eyes, but his large rabbit-like ears still bothered him. They made him feel vulnerable, but then again they made people underestimate him, and that was always a plus. Or something. His team rustled impatiently behind him, and for about the millionth time, Will hated the Secretary for making him the leader of the team. He glared back, aware his crimson eyes were frightening in the dark. The team fell silently still at once. "This is a protection detail." Will hissed. "It's as simple as they get. Don't mess it up by being restless."

His team only grumbled, save one rookie. "Not all of us have the luxury of switching types like you. I can't see in the dark." He was jabbed in the side by a senior agent, but not before the scathing remark came out. "Not all of us can be the Secretary's favorite little bunny rabbit, can we?"

Will's crimson-red eyes snapped backward, and the agent froze as Will raised his hand and a dark tendril curled around his fingers, kissing each tip before shooting out to curl around the rookie's neck. Not squeezing, but coiling around it and over his cheeks. Will's eyes were a harsh red in the dark. "Go on." Will hissed. "You're a fighting-type Pokehume. You have about double the amount of muscle mass that I do, not to mention that you're a full foot taller than me. Why don't you have a go at me and see if I'm here just because I'm the Secretary's 'favorite little bunny rabbit'?"

The senior agent who'd jabbed the rookie's side brushed a hand on his elbow. "Will." He said, his voice soft and placating.

Will snatched the tendril of dark energy back and snapped his gaze back to the targets. Ethan Hunt and Julia Hunt were the very picture of a perfect couple, his hands coiling around hers and touching foreheads protectively. Red and blue tentacle like – no, not tentacle like, Will decided. Tentacles. Red and blue tentacles that extended from his mid-back curled protectively around them. "Deoxys." Will breathed, his anger fading. "The only one in the world. I doubt he really needs our protection. IMF's best agent, isn't he?"

"We're just backup protection. But all the same, nice to be here for her, too." Will nodded and focused back onto the couple. He could feel the agent's power all the way from his hiding place. He fell back into focus, his own Dark energy spreading out below ground to feel for any intruders.

The next few days passed quietly, although the rookie decidedly avoided Will and Will did the same. The only thing that changed was Will himself – he took on his Espeon form during the day and Umbreon form doing the night. He was special. Or so he was told, he thought bitterly. He had never really _felt_ special. Pokehumes were already created by a genetic mutation that made up about 10% of the world, but even out of those he was singled out. His genes were, as the researchers put it, 'stably unstable'. He was able to switch back and forth between eight forms – Eevee and all of its evolutions – without any sort of drawback at all.

He really felt more like a freak than anything else, though he had to admit the rapid change he could go through in type was a large advantage as a field agent. And he'd honed every one of his different forms to be incredibly strong. So he knew when a feeling tugged at his Psychic senses, there was something wrong. Something was very, very wrong. But when he brought it up with the other agents, they reminded him that telling a target that they were a target was beyond breaking the rules. So he kept his mouth shut, the _something wrong _screaming at him every moment he saw Ethan Hunt.

And then it happened. Julia Hunt was killed brutally. Will gave up his field agent job and took the Chief Analyst job that the Secretary had been trying to convince him to take, because knowing that he _could have done something_ to prevent her death and yet hadn't clawed at him, made him nauseous and made him want to vomit. Never again, he vowed. Never. Never.

He stopped changing to his other forms and stayed in his Eevee form. The fluffy ears and tail along with the soft brown eyes weren't exactly threatening, but he didn't need to be threatening to be Chief Analyst. Changing into his other forms, especially the Espeon, made him feel the same choking guilt again, and he stayed away.

He'd been in the Eevee form when it happened. _It_ was when Ethan Hunt crawled into the van. Ethan looked at him, surprised. Of course he was surprised. Everyone was surprised to see a fluffy Eevee in the IMF. But Ethan quickly disregarded his presence for the IMF Secretary's. The surprised look was back on his face when the Secretary tilted his head to Will and said, _Chief Analyst._

Will was so caught up in his shock that he wasn't really aware of what was going on in the car until the Secretary got shot in the head. Ethan was screaming, screaming something, and then the car tumbled and ice cold water hit him from all sides. He froze, and his mind screamed, _Vaporeon!_ His body didn't respond, but before he could panic, firm tendrils gripped his waist and pulled him up so his head surfaced into the air pocket the car had made. "You all right?" Ethan looked concerned, and Will flinched because the tendrils holding him up were thicker than he ever remembered them seeing. Thick, broad bands of red and blue. "Defense Forme." Ethan explained. "Your ears must be waterlogged."

"Right." Will nodded, shaking. He felt his furry brown ears heavy with water. "I'm… I'm okay." _No I'm not._ Why hadn't he been able to change? Perhaps he was in too much panic, and out of practice? All he had to do was change into his Vaporeon form and he'd be getting them out of this mess in seconds. "Hey, Ethan."

"It's fine, I've got you. I know Eevees don't do well in water, but I'll get you out of this mess."

Will ignored his cockiness and focused on his Vaporeon form again, only to find that his ears weren't turning into the blue, webbed counterparts, he wasn't growing a third fin on the top of his head, and his tail wasn't thickening and lengthening into the muscular, blue power swimmer-tail. His eyes widened and his breath quickened. _Why wasn't it working?_

Ethan's tendrils tightened firmly around him. "Hey. I've got you." He said. "Just trust me." Ethan thought Will was panicking for the entirely wrong reasons, but Will was too distracted to say anything about it. Perhaps it was the shock, he tried to reason with himself. He'd try it again when he was on the ground and dry and warm, but for now he'd trust Ethan Hunt.

Ethan got them out easily, and reached up to touch Will's ear. Will flinched violently away. "Sorry." Ethan looked surprised. "Are they sensitive?"

Will blinked rapidly. No one had touched his poke-parts before. "N… No. I was just surprised." He reached up and squeezed water out of both ears. "No one's touched them before." Ethan raised an eyebrow. He held his hand steady, and Will nodded hesitatingly. He blinked in surprise when a warm heat radiated from Ethan's outstretched palms, gently drying his ears. "You're.. What? But you're a Deoxys. You don't learn any Fire moves."

Ethan smiled. "No." He agreed. "But I do come across many, _many_ TMs working as a field agent. Sunny Day's one of the more common ones, but I refined it so I could use it as a self-heater if I find myself in cold positions. But it seems like there are other uses. You're going to have to squeeze out the water in your tail first before I have hopes of drying it, though."

Will reached around and squeezed. Torrents of water fell to the ground, and Will winced. "Damn." He sighed, wringing his tail again. "Sorry." If only he could turn into a Vaporeon…

Ethan looked amused. "Not your fault. I have to admit, it looks out of place with your suit, though." Will grimaced and nodded. Many people had pointed out that his furry ears and tail pretty much canceled out the effects a suit was supposed to have. The broad tendrils of Ethan's Defense Forme held his tail cautiously as warmth emanated from them. "All right. Now that you're not leaving a dripping trail for everyone to follow, let's go."

Ethan's broad tendrils swooped together to form single tendrils on each side, one blue and one red. "Speed Forme." Will breathed, watching the tendrils tighten and shorten. Ethan smiled and held out a hand. "I don't know if I can keep up."

"No worries. I'll take care of you." Will took the hand cautiously and suddenly Ethan was running, in a speed there was _no way_ Will could follow, at least not in his Eevee form. Perhaps in his Jolteon form, or if he was running in snow in his Glaceon form, but definitely not in his Eevee form. He tried desperately again, focusing on Jolteon again this time, but the reaction was a nothing. So how was he – He looked down on the ground. Oh. Ethan glanced back and smiled.

His feet were floating. Ethan was using his telekinesis to keep him floating as he ran at his top speed, and Will cautiously stopped moving his legs. Ethan chuckled lightly and a single tendril curled protectively around his waist, but his speed didn't decrease. "Amazing." Will breathed, wondering if he could lift an entire grown-man with Espeon's telekinesis, much less run at this speed with it. "You really are IMF's best."

Ethan didn't respond, but his blue gaze was sparkling. They found the cache easily, and Ethan hoisted Will into the moving car before he hoisted himself in. The lights came on and Will cringed back when he saw two fireballs aimed at him, ready to launch. "Jesus, Ethan, we thought you were dead!" He heard a voice, but not from the woman who was glaring at them with crimson eyes, nine blonde tails swishing dangerously behind her. Jane Carter, his brain supplied. IMF Agent, Ninetales pokehume.

"We are." Will muttered under his breath, but Ethan heard and snorted.

"Who's he?" Jane's eyes were still focused on him.

"William Brandt. Chief Analyst." Ethan nodded, and the fireballs disappeared. Will looked around warily. There was only one other in the cache – Benji Dunn, IMF Agent, Reuniclus pokehume. "He's with us."

"Analyst." Jane repeated. "He's an _Eevee_."

Will ignored the implied tone and took the towel that Benji offered him with a smile. He dried himself off and wished he could just turn to Flareon and dry himself off, but another desperate attempt ended futilely. He patted himself down as best as he could, his mind racing. What could have been the problem? Maybe it was shock? Or perhaps his ability to change was nulled by his long period of _not _changing? But the ability to change was supposed to be wired into his DNA. Benji came down to sit next to him. "A little cold in here for your wet ears and tail." He looked up at Jane. "You should come up here and warm him up a bit?"

Jane grumbled, but sat down next to Will. "First you should change out of those wet clothes. You can't dry off your clothes like Ethan does." Will wanted to reply that yes, he really could, or he should be able to, but he kept quiet and changed out of his wet suit to more comfortable jeans and sweater. He had to tug his tail out manually through the tail hole, but at least the pants _had_ a tail hole. He'd experienced much of IMF's emergency clothing weren't quite tailored for Pokehumes with tails. He squatted in the corner, and Jane sent a small Will-O-Wisp at him. He cradled it in his hands, and it danced lightly around in his palm, not touching him but providing enough warmth.

He barely paid attention to the Hendricks file – he'd compiled it himself, anyway. He barely listened as Ethan and Benji and Jane planned, and crawled into the bunk in the corner when the lights went out. He barely managed to pull the covers over him before he fell into a troubled slumber.

The next thing he knew, a male voice and a female voice were talking in hushed tones. He peeked his eyes open and peered around the curtain to find Ethan and Jane sipping a drink – coffee by the smell of it – and talking in hushed tones. A soft snore informed him that Benji was still sound asleep. "He's an Eevee." Jane said, sounding exasperated. "Analyst. We're going to have to protect him."

"We need him." Ethan said softly. "Plus, we have to protect him either way. Chief Analyst means he's got loads of information. And I'm pretty sure he's got eidetic memory. We'd all be in trouble if he falls into the wrong hands." He paused. "You're worried you can't protect him. But I think he'll be fine. He has a mind shield. One strong enough that I can't really follow his movements." Mind shield? That was his Espeon part at work. Perhaps he could change now? But no, another attempt gave no results.

Jane hummed in agreement. "You think we should wake them up now?"

Ethan chuckled. "No, let them sleep for a bit longer. We've got about an hour left until we have to get off, anyway."

And that was how Will found himself in the back of a car driving through a desert, hugging the gear to his chest, his tail fur clumped and tangled everywhere from days of mistreatment.

Jane pulled a brush through his tail, and he winced as she tugged on the clumped fur. "We have to look high class." She explained, wincing an apology as a yank pulled out clumps of tail hair. "That means no tangled tail fur. I wish I had conditioner or something to ease out the tangles first, but.."

"It's okay." His eyes followed the clumps of tail fur as Jane burned all of them. "I've got more than enough. They fall out all the time anyway." He was glad when she finally ran her brush through his tail and it ran through smoothly. She pulled out suits for him – he had to tug his tail through _again_, but he was sorrier for Jane and her nine tails. He helped her pull each one out and untangle them from each other.

Benji eyed the entire exchange with a fascination. "Tails. I don't know how you deal with them, but they're quite cool." His third and fourth arms – the gel-like ones that were characteristic of the Reuniclus-humes – extended and brushed against their tails. Will had learned to stop jumping every time someone touched his poke-parts, because apparently it was pretty common.

In the end, they managed to blend into the crowd entering the tallest building in the world. The only looks they got were when people took two looks at Jane, because her luscious tails were attracting every man's attention. "Half of them are looking at you." Benji whispered when they were in the elevator. Will blinked. "You know. Your tail and your ears. You look pretty cute."

Will glared, and Ethan and Jane laughed. Cute. He reached up and tugged an ear down. It was one thing to have all the whispering at the IMF base – Will had learned to ignore them. But to have his _team _say it. "I'm a fluffy bunny." He said softly.

"That you are." Jane smiled, and Will blinked. That was the difference. Benji, Jane and Ethan held no malice when they said his ears and tail were _cute_. He blushed and ducked his head to slide into the room. Jane laughed quietly as she pressed the elevator button back down to retrieve dry-cleaning after she dropped the bags off.

It wasn't until Benji made the announcement that Ethan was going to climb the _outside_ of the Burj and Ethan agreed easily that Will really thought, Ethan Hunt is goddamned crazy. "Wait, one thing." Benji cleared his throat. "You… ah. Can't use your psychic powers. Or your tendrils."

Ethan scowled. "_What_?"

"Well, uh… Well, there's a barrier on the entire building to prevent exactly this from happening. An anti-Pokehume barrier to keep Pokehumes from climbing. You're going to have to climb manually."

About thirty seconds later, Will stood, wide-eyed at the entrance and willing himself _not to look down_ as he bit his lip and watched Ethan scale the glass walls. He only turned briefly when Jane walked in, her eyes widening, and then focused back on Ethan.

He didn't really remember the rest of the day, except that everything had gone horribly wrong, and Ethan was gone, and he was suddenly confessing everything to Benji and Jane. _It's all my fault. Julia Hunt is dead because of me._ He crawled into one of the tiny cots in the safehouse after that and wrapped his tail around him and flattened his ears.

He wasn't really sure of how to act when he saw Ethan again, and didn't know how to react when Ethan gave him pants that he _finally_ didn't need to manually pull his tail through. "Brij Nath." Ethan was explaining to Jane. "He has a fetish for furry ears and tails."

The rest of it was lost on him because Benji tried to explain how he, just like Ethan with the glass climbing, had to jump down. Twenty five feet. Freefall. Without any of his powers. He tried to come to terms with it, really he did, but he'd _never _been in a situation where he'd been without his powers. Espeon's telekinesis could have helped, definitely. Maybe, he thought desperately, his body would react if he was about to die, and his powers would come back.

Still, he found it hard to jump, and when he did, he found his ears and tail decisively brown and fluffy, tipped gently with white, and not at all the pale, sleek lavender of Espeon. This was goddamned ridiculous. He was sweating insanely, which would have been easily fixed if he was in his Flareon form, and even when sharp shrapnel of the broken robot-thing shot up at him, his body refused to do little else than tense his brown ears closer to his head. One metal edge sliced the tip of his tail, missing any of the fleshy part but cutting off most of his white fur. He winced and clutched it to him as he dove through the opening.

And his body failed him _again_ as he fought futilely against Wistrom, who tore at his ears and yanked tufts of his tail fur out. It was Benji who came to his rescue, with a shot of carefully aimed, concentrated and deadly beam of Psychic directly at Wistrom's head. "Are you all right?" Benji scrambled to him as Will shoved the power switches back up. "Your ear's bleeding." Benji breathed. "And your tail… Christ, Brandt! Your tail's soaked in blood."

Will looked back weakly at his tail. It throbbed violently, and Will saw a missing clump of fur where it was bleeding out. His ear was sliced almost completely through when he pulled down gently on it, and Benji gripped his arm. "Can you get up?" Will tried, but found himself shaking too much. "All right, that's a no, then." And then all of a sudden, the gel-like arms encircled him and Will felt pain flood out of him. Benji winced. "Pain Split." He explained, when Will looked up in confusion. "It won't do anything to stop your bleeding, but it'll help you walk out of here, at least. Let's get you to a hospital."

Will's ear was still bandaged when he came to sit across from Ethan two weeks later. His tail wound had been a flesh wound – Wistrom had peeled off some of the skin when he plucked out a chunk of his tail, but it had healed quickly and new fur was already growing back. He was constantly told to be careful with his ear, which had been hanging off of him by a thin strip of skin. It had been sewed back, and was still throbbing dully, but doctors had confirmed that all nerves and skin and muscle were connecting without any problems.

Benji took the phone, then Jane, and he and Ethan were left staring at the last phone. Will was about to rise up, without the phone, but Ethan spoke up. "Your tail." Ethan nodded at the shorter tuft of fur. "I never got to ask you if it was hurt after the jump you did." Will frowned. The jump? His tail had gotten hurt in the scuffle with Wistrom. "The tip of your tail. I noticed it was shorter than I remembered it. It got sliced off, and I wasn't sure if the blood there was from your other tail wound or if the end of your tail got sliced off."

"No." Will sighed. "If the end of my tail got sliced off, I'd be in the hospital still."

Ethan looked thoughtful. "Balance?"

"Oh. No, not balance. We're not Aipoms or anything." Will managed a shaky grin. "A big artery though." Ethan nodded again, and his gaze slid over to Will's ear. "It's doing okay. Healing. Hearing's almost back full." Ethan smiled – was that relief?

"Take it." Ethan whispered. "The phone. You're about to get up without it."

Will shook his head, so violently that a shot of pain ran through his ear and a gentle tendril came over to cup it. "I'm not picking up that phone, Ethan." He stared at the beer bottle. "Because I don't think you want me in the field." And then everything from Croatia was spilling out.

And when he was done, the tendril was still cupping his ear, and Ethan was smiling softly. Will listened first in pure confusion and desperation, but it began to dawn on him. And then he was smiling, laughing, and crying in relief. Ethan waited until he'd calmed down, and then a tendril scooped up the phone and gently offered it to him. Will leaned against the tendril still cupping his ear. "How are you doing that?" Will asked. "It feels good."

Will didn't need to explain about the ear for Ethan to understand. "Recover." Ethan smiled. "It emanates around my body. It won't heal, but it'll soothe."

Will nodded. He reached out, but hesitated. Ethan patiently waited. "I'm just an Eevee." He knew his Changing status wasn't in his files. "Not even evolved. My ears and tail might get in the way."

Ethan smiled. "You're strong, and you don't need me to tell you that, do you?" Ethan's eyes were gentle. "And I'm pretty sure Jane's nine tails would get in the way more than your ears and tail ever could." Will let himself laugh, and he held his hand open. Ethan's tendril gently deposited the phone into his hands. Ethan's tendril around his ear lingered until his stood, and nodded. "See you soon." Ethan smiled.

Will grinned. "Yeah." Maybe he didn't need to be able to Change. His Eevee form had always been sturdy, stronger than any other Eevees. He tucked his chin into his windbreaker and hid his smile. Maybe, maybe he'd just stay as a regular Eevee. Because if it was enough for Ethan Hunt, who had the rights to tell him it wasn't?


End file.
